Sermon (September 24, 1983)

by Herbert W Armstrong

With me up here are the only three, that I know, that were original members of the parent Church when it was first formed. Now I understand that there are several others who came into the headquarters’ Church up here a little later, or many who were just children and hadn’t grown up to be baptized and members yet at that time; and I will later ask you to stand up, and everybody can see who you are.

But here is Bill and Jean Kahn and Bobby Fisher. [applause] These ‘kids’ were just teenagers; and we were having regular meetings in my home, which was then I believe on … was it 5th or 3rd? It was before we finally moved to 1608 West Sixth; and I think that two of my eldest children, my two daughters, were in the group. Now, let me see. Oh, Phyllis Day. She unfortunately is no longer with us. She told me the reason was that I let everybody call me by my first name in those days. I didn’t want to put on any airs, and she said that familiarity breeds contempt; so she sort of lost respect or something. However, I regained her respect later; but that didn’t bring her back into God’s Church.

But here are three members that have been faithful and have stood all these years; and now these ‘kids’ are gray headed, like I am. [Laughter] Oh, I love these ‘kids’. [Mr. Armstrong speaks to the three on stage.] You remember when we had those meetings? (A woman’s voice is heard answering, “Yes.”) You were just teenagers, you know. What? About 14, 15, maybe 16? (A man answers “Probably 16. I was probably 17.”). Sixteen or seventeen. [Mr. Armstrong chuckles] Well, they say that all men are just little boys grown up; and I guess most women are just little girls grown up. But here we still are!

And now I’d like to have all of the others, at least who considered themselves in the Eugene Church – which is “the Parent Church” of the Philadelphia era. Would you please stand? I think they should most of them be in one area. I’m not sure they were seated that way.

How we have grown through the years. You know, since this original Church here at Eugene 50 years ago, this Church grew at the rate of 30% every year for35 years. Now we couldn’t keep up that percentage of growth after that, that brought us up to about 1968. But we are growing more in numbers every year now than we did then, just not as big a percentage. The percentage finally got pretty high, because 35 years … When you realize that we were doubling in size every 2 and 2/3rd years. We were multiplying our size by 8 in 8 years and by 64 in 16 years. And so by multiplication it finally begins to skyrocket up, and that’s what has happened to the Work of God; and it is still growing.

I’m glad to say that we’ve had a growth; it is not as big a percent, but somewhere around 6 or 8% in the last year. But 6 or 8% on around 100,000 is a pretty big growth. That is several thousand a year. We used to grow, from a few members, 30% more; but it only added a very few. Today it adds a great many. But I know it is a wonderful thing and a matter to rejoice in, after all these years.

Now this is just one little small crowd of our brethren today, one of the smallest Feast sites. There are several that are much larger than this group; and I think we have everything to thank God for, because we didn’t do it. I didn’t do it. Jesus Christ did it. I perhaps would never have yielded myself to Him if He hadn’t beaten me down in quite a different manner than He did the apostle Paul. But nevertheless He did, and brought me to surrender to Him; and not only to accept Christ, BUT TO GIVE MYSELF TO CHRIST. And I’ve tried to leave myself in His hands ever since. I haven’t done too good a job at that, but I have tried; and He has at least borne very great fruit, and we are very thankful.

[Mr. Armstrong turned to those on the stage with him and said:] Haven’t seen you in a few years, but this has been a joy. Good to see you again. I’ll see you after the service. Thank you. [Applause]

Well, you know, after 50 years we sort of get a little older. When I think back to teenagers, and now we’re looked on as elderly people and gray haired. But someone was using that slang expression, I think last evening: “You’ve come a long way baby.” [Laughter] Well, I guess we were just babes in Christ. But God has blessed this Church, and this is HIS CHURCH.

I didn’t know WHY there was a Church back in those years. I just knew I had been challenged. My wife had taken up with fanatical religion, so I thought. She was keeping Saturday instead of Sunday, and that is the most fanatical thing I ever heard of. So we had an argument about it, but I couldn’t convince her; and I wanted to save our marriage. Two can’t walk together except they be agreed, and we weren’t agreed about it.

I told her that the Bible says, “Thou shalt keep SUNDAY.” She said, “Well now, where does the Bible say that?” “Well” I said, “I don’t know. I don’t know much about the Bible.” (I didn’t then.) And she said, “Well, then how do you know?” I said, “Because all the churches keep Sunday; and they get their religion out of the Bible, don’t they?” And she said, “Well, do they?” “Well” I said, “Of course!” And so I had to start studying the Bible to see; and, to my surprise and chagrin, I found that the churches do NOT get their religion out of the Bible. They try very desperately to read their ideas of religion INTO the Bible. But what they believe did not come out of the Bible, because they believe just the CONTRARY in MOST important things. Now they don’t know why there should BE a church. I didn’t know then either. I just didn’t know.

Well now, today we are celebrating not only the 50th anniversary of the local Eugene Church as it was, which was the first Church of the Philadelphia era. I was still working with and preaching in the Sardis Churches up in the Willamette Valley, up near Jefferson, over in a little country schoolhouse at Beaver, up in that direction. But God began to reveal NEW TRUTH that the others didn’t know; and I found that those people who were humble and sincere people … They had God’s Sabbath and the truth of God’s law. They had the right name, the Church of God. They were a sincere people, but they thought they had all of the knowledge; and they would not accept any new knowledge that the Bible contained that they hadn’t seen. So they didn’t grow with us.

Now why should there be a Church in the first place? Why are WE assembled here? Why do we HAVE a Church? Why should there BE a Church? You ask the average Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Congregationalist, Church of Christ person, anybody. I think they would be stumped for an answer.

What’s the purpose of the Church? Why should there BE one? What is it? Just a social club, or what is it? Well, the word “church” is an English word. Now, all of the New Testament is written in the Greek language; and in the Greek language the word was “ecclesia.” That’s a Greek word. And ecclesia means ‘come out ones,’ and it means come out of this world.

Come out of this world! Well, I didn’t understand that 50 years ago. I wasn’t able to teach that to the teenagers that were meeting with me once a week either. But we read in II Peter 3 and verse 18, the last couple of verses of II Peter, that ” … we must GROW in the grace ad the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”

When we first are converted and receive the Holy Spirit, we don’t receive God’s Holy Spirit 100% full measure, or without measure, or without any proportion of a measure, like Jesus Himself had. HE ALONE had the Holy Spirit FULLY and COMPLETELY – “without measure” as the Bible words it. But WE receive just a measure of the Holy Spirit, and we’re told to GROW IN GRACE (and that is in God’s Spirit, in God’s favor that He favors us with as He just injects His Spirit literally into us) AND IN THE KNOWLEDGE of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

We start out as BABES in Christ. But a baby must grow up physically. We are SPIRITUAL BABES, and we must grow up spiritually; and some of us did. Most people who profess to be Christians never do. All these (a few million people over the United States) that call themselves “born-again Christians” have no knowledge whatsoever of what it means to be born again. They are not born again any more than a skunk or a jack rabbit. They haven’t any conception of what it means; and I doubt if they’ve ever become even BABES in Christ, let alone growing up into full stature of adulthood spiritually. No. Spiritual babes must grow up, and God has finally revealed that to us; and in this Church that is what we’ve been doing.

But now why did Christ come to call us out of this world? Because the word ‘church’ comes from “ecclesia” which means ‘come out’ of the world. What’s wrong with the world? Why should we COME OUT of it? Well, I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it. You look at the world today; and you see a world of AWESOME progress and advancement in technology, in science, in many of the accomplishments of human beings. But nearly all of that accomplishment is in materialism and the things of matter.

But SPIRITUALLY we find this world full of APPALLING EVILS, and the evils are multiplying. Man is against man. Neighbor is against neighbor. Group is against group. Husbands and wives are against one another. Parents and children are against one another, capitol and labor, black and white, nation against nation. We just can’t get along with one another. The world is in trouble as it never has been before. But this is NOT GOD’S WORLD!

Now, people just can’t understand that. I was interviewed by a reporter from The Webster Guard yesterday afternoon; and I said, “This is not God’s world. This is Satan’s world.” I said, “But everybody thinks it’s God’s world. I suppose you do, don’t you?” And he was quite embarrassed. Well, yes, he did. He thought God had a lot to do with this world. Well, God is concerned about this world. He loved this world enough to give His own Son to die for it; but He is not OF this world. There is a great difference.

He’s concerned about it, yes; but will it shock you if I say that God is not trying to SAVE this world NOW. Now, God is going to save this world – and I mean the WHOLE world, ALL OF IT; but He hasn’t started to do that just yet. He will do that. He is only calling certain ones at this time, and He is going to call others later. And those who have lived and died uncalled will be resurrected to judgment, because in Hebrews 9:27 you will read “it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.” And in I Corinthians, let me see, the 15th chapter and 22nd verse … ”as in Adam all die .” I tell you anybody that is under 160 years old (and I don’t think there is anybody on earth as old as 160 today) … everybody else whoever LIVED is DEAD. They are no longer living. They are no longer here. And they DIED IN ADAM. They are going to be made alive by a resurrection in Christ, and then their eyes are going to be opened.

Oh, they’re going to be JUDGED; and they’re going to be pronounced GUILTY; and the sentence is going to be DEATH. And that sentence is going to be PRONOUNCED on them when they face the judgment seat of CHRIST. And then Christ will tell them, “But what would you say if you knew that I paid your penalty for you? Now it’s conditional. If you want to repent of the way you lived, if you want to live better than you did in the other life when you were on this earth, if you want to begin to live GOD’S WAY instead of Satan’s way, then My death will take the place of yours and you can now receive that Tree of Life that Adam rejected. You can now receive the Holy Spirit.”

They’ll be given 100 years of a sort of probationary sentence; and, if they live according to God’s law and with His Spirit (which He will then give them by measure, of course), if they grow in grace and knowledge, if they overcome – they shall inherit eternal life. Now, not everybody is going to inherit eternal life. Some are going to refuse even then. Otherwise you wouldn’t read in the Bible that they are going to be “ashes under the soles of our feet.” that they are going to be burned up. Not burning forever and ever and ever in a hell fire that Dante Alighieri pictured, but burned up.

Now they don’t understand, they don’t believe, that this is Satan’s world. I’d like you to notice a few scriptures. Ephesians 6 and verse 12 where is says here “we wrestle not against flesh and blood.” Now we are all having struggles. The Communists have a struggle, “the struggle of the Proletariat” they call it. It’s a constant struggle so that they can overcome all other nations and rule the world. That’s what they want to do. That’s their goal.

We all are struggling against this, and that, and the other thing in the world. It’s a world of contention. It’s a world of competition. It’s a world of evil, of person against person, class against class, group against group. But we are not struggling against other PEOPLE, and we don’t REALIZE that; but against the “rulers of the darkness of this world .”

Now, “rulers of the darkness of this world.” WHO is really ruling this world? Notice the rest of this sentence, “against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Now that can otherwise be translated “against wicked spirits in high places.” THEY are the RULERS of this world – the EVIL WICKED SPIRITS: Satan and other demons (that are former angels) with him.

Now if you will notice next in II Corinthians the 4th chapter, verses 3 and 4:

II Corinthians 4:3-4 But if our gospel [which is the gospel of the Kingdom of God, Christ’s gospel, the gospel he preached. If it] be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: (4) In whom the GOD OF THIS WORLD[which is Satan the Devil] hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel [which is the Kingdom of God, the Family of God] … should shine unto them.

Satan has BLINDED the eyes of the people of this world. He is the GOD of this world. PEOPLE WORSHIP A GOD, BUT THEY DON’T WORSHIP THE SAME GOD THAT CREATED THE EARTH. THEY DON’T WORSHIP THE GOD THAT THIS CHURCH DOES! THEY WORSHIP A GOD WHOSE REAL NAME IS SATAN THE DEVIL. We need to understand these things.

Now next, if you will notice Ephesians the 2nd chapter and the first two verses, where Paul is talking to those who had been converted in Ephesus. They were babes in Christ. They had received His Holy Spirit. And the 2nd chapter of Ephesians starts off with this:

Ephesians 2:1-2 And you [you new Christians there] hath he [God] quickened, [which means ‘made alive’] who were dead in trespasses and sins [The wages of sin is death, and the death sentence was already on them because they had sinned; and so they were considered spiritually dead, not physically but spiritually dead.]; (2) Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world [This is the world we are to come out of, this world. And all of us did walk according to the course of this world.], according to the prince of the power of the air …

Satan the Devil, the prince of the power of the air! I could never understand that until I went on the air and broadcast. And I broadcast into a microphone, like I have a small one here in front of me; and it would go out on the airwaves and go right through the air and go into thousands of homes, and thousands of people would listen and hear everything I was saying. It went through the air! SATAN BROADCASTS THROUGH THE AIR. Now he doesn’t broadcast in words and sounds. He doesn’t broadcast in pictures like television. He broadcasts in attitudes and states of mind, attitudes of hostility, attitudes of jealousy and envy, attitudes of resentment, attitudes that are contrary to God’s attitude of love and cooperation and sharing and giving and helping.

So, you see, we formerly were living according to that way; and he is the god of this world. And this is not God’s world. It is Satan’s world. And you will read, for example in the 12th chapter of Revelation and in verse 9, that ALL NATIONS all over this WORLD are DECEIVED; and they’re deceived by Satan the Devil. He has deceived all nations.

Now how was this Church raised up? It started with this little Church in Eugene. I went and tried to see this little church building that we finally bought back in those years. I think that was about, let’s see, about 1935 or 36 we bought that church building. (It’s been moved. I went to a place supposed to be it, but it wasn’t the church at all; and I don’t know what happened to it. I wasn’t able to find it.)

But I was challenged in the year of 1926 regarding the Sabbath day and also regarding the theory of evolution. Now the theory of evolution was a theory of origins of how human beings came to be, how human life originated. Evolution was then rapidly becoming the basic concept on which all knowledge and education is based in the universities of this country and in the world, in England and Germany, other places. And I was challenged on it.

I had never studied it in depth, but I was more or less conversant with it; and I simply did not accept it. I didn’t believe it, and I was told I was ignorant by a sister-in-law just fresh out of college at that time. She had had a dose of evolution injected into her young mind at that time. Well, I was pretty proud in those days; and that sort of nettled me; and I told her I was going to make her eat those words. I said, “Unless you are right … in that case, I’ll have to accept it; but I think you are wrong.”

So I studied evolution right along with the matter of the Sabbath, because I was sure that the Bible said ‘Thou shalt observe Sunday.’ I said that all the churches received their doctrines, their beliefs, from the Bible. Well, there was a six-month intensive, in depth, study. I was studying up to 1:30 in the morning. Many times my wife Loma would yell out and say “Herbert, when are you coming to bed? Are you going to stay up all night?” She’d been asleep for an hour or two, and I was still studying. Well, I’d come to bed. I didn’t get full nights sleep. I’d be up in the morning, down at the public library waiting for it to open at 9 o’clock, to go on studying more. I studied almost constantly.

I had to eat crow, if you know what I mean. I found my wife was right. I found that the churches do not get their religion out of the Bible, but just the contrary; and I began to learn that the Bible said many things I had not believed it said. Well, I won’t go into that further because I think many of you know the story anyway. But I was converted in the spring of 1927. The challenge came in the autumn of 1926, but in the spring of 1927 I had all but accepted the Sabbath. And then I came to one passage that stumped me, and that was Colossians 2 and verse 16.

Now, let’s see. Here we are, where it says: Colossians 2:16-17 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days: (17) Which are a shadow of things to come ; but the body is of Christ.

Now you notice the “shadow.” If the shadow comes from the sun, the sun has to be behind you. Now if it is the shadow is of things behind, the sun would be in front and you are looking backwards. But if the shadow is of things to come, the shadow you see is things that are going to come, and so the sun would then be behind you and you’re looking forward into the future.

Now, the Sabbath and the monthly {1} new moons and the annual holy days were a SHADOW OF THINGS TO COME. In other words, they represented THINGS TO COME that hadn’t happened yet. THEY WERE OF THE FUTURE, not of the past, and people were using that to say that they DID AWAY WITH THE SABBATH. That’s what Methodists, and Sunday churches, and Baptists were all saying.

Now I found a book written by a former 7th Day Adventist who had become soured on 7th Day Adventism and had left and had written a book trying to prove how bad the 7th Day Adventists were. He took this passage, and he showed that everyplace in the Bible where the weekly Sabbath, the monthly new moons, and the annual Sabbaths are used together. (And there are several places I didn’t know they had been used in a number of places all through the Old Testament.) In EVERY place they were simply used together; and they were talking about times on which sacrifices had been held. That’s sacrificial meat.

So it says ”let no man judge you in meat or drink or in RESPECT … ” Well, at first I took that to mean the Sabbath was abolished. I told my wife that; and, when I told her that, she was so concerned and so worried that that night she did not sleep a wink. She spent that whole night in prayer; and the next morning she said, “I want you to go down to the public library and I want you to get the original Greek words for every word in that paragraph and look it up.” And she said, “I know that God has revealed to me that some place you are going to find a mistranslation and that it doesn’t mean that those days are done away.”

I did that, and I found that this word “respect” comes from the Greek word “m-e-r-e-i.” I don’t know just how to pronounce it (whether it’s ‘meer-i’ or how you pronounce it), but it means ‘sacrificial meat observance of.’ So here’s what it meant. “Let no man judge you in meat or in drink or in the sacrificial meat observance of a holy day, or a new moon, or the Sabbath.”

The sacrificial meat and the sacrificing of animals was DONE AWAY BY THE BLOOD OF CHRIST. AND YET THESE DAYS WERE A SHADOW OF WHAT IS TO COME. THEY FORETOLD THE FUTURE. THEY HAD MEANING FOR THE FUTURE. I said INSTEAD OF DOING AWAY WITH THE DAYS IT CONFIRMS THEM. And I SAW it; and I came to her and said, “THAT MEANS WE HAVE TO KEEP THE ANNUAL SABBATHS AS WELL.”

Now the 7th Day Adventists translated that this way: “Let no man judge you in meat or in drink (and they admitted that did away with it) or in respect of a holy day (and they said the ‘holy day’ means the weekly Sabbath) or a new moon or of the Sabbath day” – of the Sabbath day or a holy new moon or Sabbath day. Now the Bible would be almost illiterate if it said anything like that. The holy day had to be a different day than the weekly Sabbath, and everywhere they are used together it was speaking of annual Sabbaths and not weekly Sabbaths; but the weekly Sabbath is mentioned with it.

Now what about the new moons? Well, I researched that very thoroughly; and no place did I find where new moons were ever observed as a necessary ordinance of any kind, or where they were commanded. We did think, however, that they were a certain day. It was a way of marking a certain time from other times, and we did have Bible studies every new moon for some time. But there is no command for that, and it is not a holy day. It is not a commanded convocation or time of assembly in any manner, shape, or form. And so the Church has not continued to do that, because there is no reason for it. If we wanted to have some sort of a thing like a monthly Bible study, that would be a good time for it. But instead of that, in most of our Churches, we have weekly Bible studies to have one every week besides the Sabbath observance.

Well, that showed me that I not only then did have to keep the Sabbath but also the annual Sabbaths. Now I didn’t see that we, at that time, that we had to get away and congregate together for 8 days in the Feast of Tabernacles. I just saw the weekly Sabbath. But my wife and I began then to keep them in the spring of 1927, and I’ve been keeping them ever since; and so I am sure that I have been keeping them longer than anyone of you here.

Now, it was 7 years before I could induce the Church to do it. I was preaching then. A little later, I was preaching before the people that were of the Sardis era up in the Willamette valley; and, of course, I preached about this. I told them that was new light that we ought to observe, and that it is commanded. Now I went back and I found that every one of these annual feast days are commanded FOREVER, and I found that Christ observed them. I found the apostles observed them AFTER the Church started, and that the early Church for at least three or four hundred years (the real true early Church) continued to observe those days.

I told the people of the Sardis congregations that were meeting up in the valley. They LAUGHED ME TO SCORN. They would have none of it, and some of their ministers got very ANGRY. There was a time up in Beaver when I was preaching up there; and I was sharing the pulpit every other week then with Roy Daly, one of the young Sardis ministers. He preached every other week, and I preached every other week.

Well, I had agreed I wouldn’t preach this on the Sabbath because they were so irate against the annual holy days, the annual Sabbaths. But they thought, in fairness to me, that they should give me a time to FULLY explain it; and so we had a weeknight that was set apart for me to do it. I remember that Roy Daly tried to heckle me, and I couldn’t go ahead. He would heckle me so I couldn’t even finish the sentence.

Finally, I just told him that this meeting had been set apart for me to explain it. I said, “The other brethren want to hear it.” And I said, “Roy, you don’t want them to hear it.” I said, “SIT DOWN AND BE QUIET.” He continued to heckle. I said, “Roy, if you open your mouth and say another word, I’ll have the ushers THROW YOU OUT OF HERE, AND IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST I’LL COMMAND YOU TO LEAVE HERE. He got up and walked out. He was not going to have any of it. And the Sardis people, I am sorry to say, never would accept that truth. Never did.

Isn’t it a terrible yoke of bondage that we have to be here, brethren? Don’t you feel punished? Isn’t God a harsh, stern God to tell us we have to be here in this meeting, and we have to have these holy days and festival once a year? Well, I don’t think so; and I’m sure you don’t either! Well, that revealed to me the holy days. I continued my study, and I’ve continued it ever since; and I have perhaps learned more in the last year (my 91st – 92nd year I am into now) than any other year.

Anyway, I was ordained by the Oregon Conference in June 1931. Now, I was converted and began the study of the Bible. In other words, the Bible is the WORD OF GOD. Now Jesus Christ is the Word of God. JESUS is the Word of God in person. This Bible is the Word of God in writing, but it is precisely the same Word of God,

Jesus taught the early apostles. WHERE DID THE CHURCH GET ITS TEACHING? It didn’t get it from Jesus, and it didn’t get it from Satan. It got it from the APOSTLES, and the prophets and the writings of the prophets. That’s why you read in Ephesians the 2nd chapter that the church was ”founded on the foundation of the apostles AND the prophets the apostles of the New Testament, the prophets of the Old (because there were no prophets in the New Testament that had anything to do with the founding of the Church, or the teaching of the Church, or the setting of policies, or the giving of truth to the Church).

I think there are only, I believe, 4 or 5 prophets even MENTIONED in the New Testament; and not one of them had anything to do with the administration or the revealing of knowledge to the Church. They were not prophets in that sense at all. So it is referring definitely to the prophets of the Old [Testament] (and they are constantly quoted in the New Testament) and by the apostles. The apostles received their knowledge, which they taught the Church. They received it from Jesus in person AND from the writings of the PROPHETS.

NOW, WHERE DID I RECEIVE THE KNOWLEDGE in this day and age? I received it in the same manner exactly. The Bible IS the Word of God. It is Jesus Christ then IN WRITING. And THE SAME JESUS taught me (only He taught me in writing through the Bible) that taught the early apostles. But first He had to open my mind. He had to bring me to surrender to Him and to His will, where I would be WILLING to believe Him.

You know the hardest thing for anyone to do is to admit that he is WRONG, and the second hardest thing for ANYBODY to do is BELIEVE God or BELIEVE CHRIST. NOW THERE ARE MILLIONS THAT CLAIM TO BELIEVE IN CHRIST. I told a Catholic woman one time, I said, “You don’t even believe God.” She said, “I do too believe in God! Don’t you dare say I don’t.” I said, “I didn’t say that.” I said, “You don’t believe God. You just say you believe in Him, that’s something all else again. But God speaks in the Bible, and you don’t believe much of what it says. Very little of what it says do you believe.” (Chuckles) She quieted down.

Well, anyway, say I began to study and God began to teach me (Christ did, through His written Word.) 100 TIME CYCLES from the time He began to teach the early apostles. He began to teach them in 27 AD. He began to teach me in 1927. They were ORDAINED on the DAY OF PENTECOST when the HOLY SPIRIT came into them in June 31 AD. I was ORDAINED in June 1931, just 100 time cycles later. Now is that altogether just a coincidence, or did God plan it that way brethren? What do you think?

Well, while I was preaching for them and finally, first on a $20 a week salary, and finally on $3.00 a week. It was during the Depression, and that was back in 1933; and two places opened up for ministers. Now we had a couple of ministers, up in Oregon here, from California. And the Church up at Harrisburg was opened up for some meetings, and the little school out here called the Firbutte School. (It’s not there any longer. It’s been torn down; and there is a lake in its place, I understand, about 8 miles west of here.)

Of course, the ministers from southern California and the Los Angeles area demanded that they have the Church at Harrisburg and that I take the little schoolhouse. It had 36 seats. Well, I had services there for 6 weeks, 6 nights a week; and our average attendance was about 40. In other words, there was an average of 4 people standing for every service. Some nights it wasn’t even full, and other nights it was very much overcrowded; but that was the average.

I started meetings there on July the 1st 1933, and it ended on August the 12th with 19 members in the Church that is now “the Parent Church” of the Philadelphia era. The Church was not officially organized as a Church until October. I don’t have the date of that, and I don’t know whether I could find it out unless someone here might remember.

But I had proved the existence of God, which I was shaken about when I studied evolution because you can’t believe evolution straight and still believe in God. Some people kid themselves that they can and that evolution was the way God created, but it isn’t; and no died-in-the-wool evolutionist believes there is any God at all. So I had proved that God exists.

Next I had to prove is the Bible a real authority? Is the Bible the WORD of God? Can I RELY on it as an AUTHORITY? IS IT GOING TO JUDGE ME in the Judgment? AND I PROVED THAT. NOW I HAD SOMETHING TO STAND ON. I KNEW THAT THIS GOD WAS AND THAT THIS WAS GOD SPEAKING. I began to study it, and my WHOLE HEART AND SOUL was in it. I was so interested.

Now I came, in that first 6 months, to an understanding about law and grace. I came to understand about the gospel (that is, the Kingdom of God), but I didn’t fully understand what the Kingdom of God is yet. I understood about the annual Sabbaths as well as the weekly Sabbath. I understood that we were the 10 tribes of Israel, and the identity by physical birth is Israelite. I came to understand, had the key to, prophecy and began to understand the prophecies (which most people couldn’t understand). But there was so much yet I had not learned and didn’t understand at that time.

Now, why should there be a Church in the first place? What is the purpose? What is the function of the Church? WHY DO WE HAVE A CHURCH? WHY NOT JUST DISBAND AND FORGET IT? The Church must have a PURPOSE. THERE MUST BE A REASON FOR IT. Brethren, we need to stop and think of these things. Well, I learned that later as we went along.

Now the Church comes from that word ‘ecclesia’ which means ‘called out’ – called out of this world to be separate from the world. Then I had to finally learn that this is not God’s world. This is Satan’s world. I gave you a few scriptures at the beginning of this sermon on that.

Well, what is the origin of Satan? Did God create a Devil? How did Satan gain this world? How did it come to be his world? How did he get a hold of it? Well, we’ll turn back to II Peter 2{2} and verse 4. Let’s see, do I have that marked off here? Yes, II Peter 2{3} and verse 4.

II Peter 2:4 For if God spared not the angels that sinned , but cast them down to … [Tartaroo the original word is. It should not be ‘hell’ here because tartaroo has a different meaning altogether. That was the Greek word.] and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgment.

So angels sinned. Now, that was a stunner! I thought angels were just perfect and holy and could not sin. But this says that angels DID SIN. Now HOW? What caused them to sin? And where did it all start? Finally I found, if you’ll turn back in the Old Testament … (Now I have to use a different Bible because I have to use a very large print because of my eyes, and a magnifying glass even then.) Back in the 14th chapter of Isaiah and beginning with verse 12, here it speaks of the super archangel called Lucifer, and it says:

Isaiah 14:12-14 How art thou fallen from heaven O Lucifer,[Now Lucifer is a Hebrew word that means ‘one who brings light’ or ‘shining star of the dawn.’ “How art though cut down to the ground O Lucifer”] son of the morning! [That is the morning star, bringing light.] How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! [Or ‘thou who didst weaken the nations cut down to the ground.’] (13) For thou hast said in thine heart I will ascend into heaven, [So he must have been under heaven, to ascend up to heaven.] I will exalt MY THRONE [He was on a throne. WHERE was that throne? It wasn’t in heaven. Notice it, ‘I will exalt my throne’] above the stars of God [And there ‘stars’ is a symbol of angels.]: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the [far] sides of the north [That is the only place in the Bible where it tells you the location of God’s heaven, where God’s throne is.]: (14) I will ascend above the heights of the clouds[So his throne must have been on earth, you see.]; I will be like the most High. [Or, ‘I will become the most high.’]

He was going to knock God off the throne and take over. That was the FIRST COUP. HE WAS PUT ON THIS EARTH TO ADMINISTER THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD. He was put on this earth to administer the government of God. Now he became jealous of God, and he said he was going to ascend up to heaven and take over the whole throne of God.

Now next I would like to read Ezekiel 28 where it says about him again; this time he is the one of whom the Prince of Tyre was only a type, and it lifts up to the great anti-type of Satan. And here, beginning with verse 12, it says in the middle of that verse:

Ezekiel 28:12-14 … Thou [speaking to this same Lucifer, thou] sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.[In other words, the sum total of wisdom and beauty. You could never say that about a human being. So he is not talking here about a human being.] (13) Thou has been in Eden the garden of God …[And so on] (14) Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth {4} …

… where God revealed to Moses the throne of God in heaven, and he made an earthly pattern out of matter of that throne. It shows that there were two archangels, or cherubs, whose wings spread out over the very throne of God in heaven; and he was one of those anointed cherubs. So he had been taught in the government of God at the very throne of God in heaven. Now he was set on a throne of his own here.

At Ambassador College we teach and train some future ministers. After we have taught them, we send them out and put them in charge of a local church to administer the government of God there in that local Church. Well, it’s the same thing. Lucifer had been instructed on the very throne of God; and now God put him, as we say it down there, out in the field. (Eugene here is up in the field, and Chicago is out in the field and so is New York according to our just ordinary shoptalk down at Pasadena .) So he was, you might say, put out now to represent God and administer God’s government here on the EARTH. Now it says, ”thou art the anointed cherub that covereth.” Then verse 15:

Ezekiel 28:15 Thou wast PERFECT in thy ways from the day that thou wast CREATED till iniquity was found in thee.

God make him a PERFECT super archangel. Angels have minds, minds much superior to human minds. But character is the decision of the mind to go the right way, and to choose that way, and to will to go that way even though you might have desires to go the other way – because it’s right. He had been taught the right way, but he deliberately willed to go the other way. Now iniquity is lawlessness. In other words, rebellion against law. Now why did he do it? Verse 17 shows why.

Ezekiel 28:17 Thine heart was lifted up because of they beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness …

He was so beautiful he was just BRILLIANT – BRILLIANTLY BRIGHT, bright like the sun; and that led to vanity, self glory, and he wanted to glorify himself. He wanted to go knock God off His throne. He wanted to take over and rule for himself. But he was cast back down to earth, because God was his Creator and God was more powerful. Now he became Satan the Devil. His angels became demons.

But he was on a throne to administer THE GOVERNMENT ON THIS EARTH. But, of course, he was put here to administer GOD’S GOVERNMENT. He REJECTED GOD’S GOVERNMENT, and he chose a government of his own. Now do you know that the government of Satan is operating in this world, and the whole world is following that government and loyal to it? I think you never thought of it this way.

Now let me explain something that perhaps you never thought of before. I spoke not too long ago to the Law School of the University of Southern California, was introduced by the Dean of the School of Law and was introduced then finally by the President of the University who sat there with me. And I mentioned in that little speech … (That this had been broadcast on the Sunday program on the air. In fact, my speech was put on the air. You may have seen it.) I mentioned that, when I was 5 years old, my father had said that I would be a Philadelphia lawyer when I grew up because I asked so many crazy questions. He got tired of answering them. And I said, in a way that I didn’t expect then, that perhaps this prophecy had been fulfilled.

Then I said that I was challenged in 1927 on a point of LAW. (It was the law of God about the Sabbath. I didn’t tell them what it was.) And I said, “So I went to a LAW book to study this point of law.” Now I said, “The law book I went to is just filled with law from beginning to end. But it is a textbook on law that not many Universities, not many Law Schools, have in their library. You might search and see if you have one here. But I feel sure that most Law Schools don’t have this book in their law library, and yet it’s a book of LAW. It’s a book called The Holy Bible. Now you wouldn’t think it has anything to say about law, but beginning the very 2nd chapter in the beginning all the way to the last chapter in the bible, it’s LAW, LAW, LAW ALL THE WAY THROUGH.”

I said, “You may know that the Bible talks about sin; and it says ’sin is the transgression of the LAW.’ It’s talking about LAW.” Now I said, “I had to learn what LAW is. What do you mean LAW? Let’s define it. Here in your Law School you teach law.” I said, “Law is merely rules of conduct. It’s merely the rules of the way you live – a way of life. The rules of an athletic game might well be called the law of the game.” Now I said, “Here at your University of Southern California is one of the great football schools of the United States. You often are rated number one in football among all the universities of this nation. You are very strong in track. You are very strong in basketball and in baseball, and you supply many of the players that are players in the major league that are graduates of this university.”

Now I said, “The rules of an athletic game could be called the LAWS of the game. You can’t have government without LAW; and there is a law in one form or another on the foundation of EVERY GOVERNMENT, whether it is a municipality of a city, or a state government, the national government or the government of any nation. In the United States the foundation is called the Constitution of the United States; and it’s merely a code of LAW, which cannot be violated. It tells us HOW TO LIVE.” Well, they never thought about that before.

I know there was a woman who had been a lawyer and had been a member of the Supreme Court of the State of California was there; and she came up afterwards and said, “Well, Mr. Armstrong you gave us something to think about.” Well, I guess they just hadn’t thought of it that way. And I might say, incidentally, that later the Dean of the Law School called us up at our offices and said that he had searched; and he said, “What do you think? We did find one Bible in our library.” But he said, “I put in an order now for about a dozen, so we are going to have several Bibles in our Law School from here on.” [Chuckles] Well, maybe I did one bit of good there anyway.

So you see here was one who let vanity, and vanity is self-law. Now then, what is the law of God? What is the basis of it? In other words, let’s go back to the origin of it. How did it start? WHAT IS THE LAW OF GOD, WHY IS IT? HOW DID IT START? It starts back as you read in John the 1st chapter in the New Testament in the first 4 verses.

John1:1 In the beginning was the Word, [Now who was the Word? Verse 14 says, “The Word was [later] made flesh and dwelt among us … ” and became Jesus Christ. So it was Jesus Christ before He was born.], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

So He was God even before He was born as a human; and when He was born as a human He was still God in the human flesh, or ‘God with us.’ His name was Immanuel (as you read in the 6th chapter of Isaiah), and Immanuel means ‘God with us.’ He was God in the human flesh. He had lived forever with God, and God had lived forever. There never was a time when They didn’t exist. But it says They LIVED, in Them was LIFE. So They lived. HOW did They live? A WAY OF LIFE! HOW DID THEY GET ALONG?

There are two principals enunciated in the Bible. One is: “Two cannot walk together except they be agreed .” The other is: ONE MUST LEAD THE OTHER. ONE MUST BE THE BOSS. Why do we have trouble between husband and wife? Usually it is because the wife is trying to be the boss and lead. God made the husband to do the leading, but he doesn’t do it; and many a wife says she has to lead because her husband won’t, and that’s not the way it ought to be.

We had a sermon on this very thing the first Sabbath after the new fall session, and College opened and there were many new freshmen there. In that sermon it was said that male students must grow up to be men and that men must, if they marry, must rule their households. But he said they must rule with loving authority, and I like that expression. Not with harsh authority. They must dominate but NOT DOMINEER; and they must rule in LOVE, and so that they are as much concerned or maybe even more concerned about their wife’s happiness and welfare in every way than they are about their own. They want her to be happy.

They are not ruling for their own self- pleasure, but for hers just as much as their own. But they still should be in charge, and they should be in charge over the children. Today most men are ABDICATING their AUTHORITY, and many women are having to take over; and more and more WOMEN are trying to take men’s JOBS and do the work of MEN. IT OUGHT NOT SO TO BE! And that means the whole country is going down and down, until it will go OUT.

This country is going to be defeated in WAR, and the United States is going to be BEATEN. I TELL YOU THAT ON THE AUTHORITY OF JESUS CHRIST. I’ve told foreign kings that around the world, and they’re sort of startled when I say that; but I say it with authority. There is something WRONG with this world. People don’t know how to solve their problems. Now there’s a way of life, and the only reason the world is in trouble is the way we’re LIVING. In other words, we are breaking God’s LAW. That’s why.

Now how did the Word and God live before the Word became Christ? They loved one another. When Jesus was being baptized, God the Father said: ”This is my BELOVED Son [He loved Him.] in whom I am well pleased,” He said. Jesus loved the Father. He said, ”I have obeyed my Father.” “I have kept my Father’s commandments … think not I have come to destroy the law,” He said. And so, of course, the churches all think He came to destroy the law, don’t they?

If He said, “Do this,” people say, “No, we won’t.” If He said, “Don’t do that,” they say, “Well, let’s do that.” They want to do just the opposite of what God says. To BELIEVE God and OBEY God is the HARDEST THING IN THE WORLD. PEOPLE DON’T WANT TO DO IT because Satan is putting his ATTITUDE in their minds. That’s why.

God’s government then is based on His law. His law is the way of love – outgoing concern for the good of others. It’s the way of cooperation. It’s the way though of leadership too; and ONE must LEAD, but He must lead in LOVE and in loving authority. We don’t have much of that in this world, unfortunately. Now that is God’s Word, and in the Church we find that the Church called out of this world is told WE in the Church must ALL SPEAK THE SAME THING. WE MUST ALL BE AGREED. BUT AGREED IN WHAT? AGREED IN THE WORD OF GOD, IN THE LAW OF GOD, IN THE WAY OF LIFE OF GOD. WE’RE NOT TO LIVE LIKE THE WORLD LIVES; BUT LIVE AS JESUS DID LIVE; and live as God lives, and as Jesus and God lived together before He even became Jesus.

And that is the Word we must speak, and we must all speak the same thing. The Bible says MARK those that cause divisions among you and avoid them, and we are disobeying God IF WE DON’T mark those that are trying to cause division. The only two ways we can avoid them: one is we all get out of the Church and leave them in, and the other is to put them out. We sort of prefer to put them out and leave the rest of us in, so that’s the way we do it. Now if you think that is wrong, why maybe you’d better leave too; but I’m sure you don’t.

Now we come to Satan’s law. Satan disagreed with God. He disagreed that we must be under authority and that it must be the way of kindness and love toward others, and that there must be submission to the authority of God and all of us living the same way. Satan came to believe, “I want to go my own way. I don’t want to go God’s way.” And so his way was to teach his angels to go your own way. And so finally, God you see … Go back to Genesis 1:1.

Genesis 1:1, 26 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis 1:26 And God said [And the word for ‘God’ is ‘Elohim’ which means more than one. It meant God and the Word. God said,] Let US make man in OUR image … [It’s both God and the Word, and man was made in their image, after their likeness physically.]

Now God had His law, and He began to reveal His law and His way of life to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. But they were made out of human flesh, out of the ground. Genesis 2 verse 7 says:

Genesis 2:7 The Eternal {5} God formed man of the dust of the ground [and that’s all he is, just dust] and man [the dust of the ground] became a living soul …

So the dust of the ground became a soul, not spirit. The soul wasn’t made from spirit. It was made from dirt. That’s all. It’s physical, not spiritual. But Adam was made incomplete. You know, it’s just like a women baking a cake. Maybe it is a two-layered cake, which she bakes in two layers; but it is still not complete. So she puts one on top of the other, and then puts the icing on. Now God hadn’t put the icing on, so to speak. Adam was complete in a sense; but yet he was incomplete because God wanted him to reproduce and have children, and the poor man didn’t know how to do it. He was just a man, and all by himself he couldn’t have children. I don’t think you’ve ever seen a man yet that could do it. And so God gave him an anesthesia – put him into a deep sleep, it says in the Bible; and God took out one of his ribs. He didn’t even feel it. God made a woman out of that rib, and presented the woman to him; and now he was PHYSICALLY COMPLETE, but he still was not SPIRITUALLY and MENTALLY complete.

Now he had a MIND, and a mind is the physical brain; and his brain is no better than a cow’s brain, or an elephant’s brain, or a chimpanzee’s brain. But they can’t think, they can’t reason, they can’t make decisions, they can’t plan and design; and man’s brain can. WHY? Because God put a SPIRIT in man! Now man is not made out of spirit. He is made out of the dust of the ground. But the dust of the ground, the soul, had a spirit put into it in its brain, in its mind. And that spirit empowers the brain to think, to reason, to appreciate such things as music and art and literature. Animals don’t. And to have attitude of either love and cooperation, or attitude of envy and jealousy and antagonism and controversy and competition, leading to violence and destruction. Now Satan had turned to that, and he had become perverted in his mind and his thinking; and he is a spirit being.

God’s purpose now was to reproduce Himself. You find that in the 8th chapter of Romans where it says that “Jesus Christ was the firstborn of many brethren.” I mentioned this last Wednesday night, the beginning of the Festival; and you saw it on the screen of how God made us {6} to have character. We have to make a choice, and it’s a matter of attitude. Are we going to have hostility towards others? Are we going to be filled with vanity? Satan was filled with vanity, and vanity means ‘I want to glorify myself.’

You know, we’ve had this matter come up in the Church now, within the last year or two about. We settled the matter of men smoking several years ago; and now we’ve had to get to the matter of women painting their face, makeup. If there were no mirrors, no woman would ever pain their face. And I think if mother Eve had had a looking glass or a mirror, she would have started it right then. She didn’t start it. It was the harlots that started it later on; and I find now that in ancient Israel they regarded painting the face as HARLOTRY, and only a harlot ever did it. That’s the way they considered it in ancient Israel.

But women do it to glorify themselves, and because they want to be like the world, and because they’re afraid the world and other women are going to scorn them if they aren’t like other women and don’t paint up like other women do. IT’S ONLY VANITY, AND YOU WOMEN ALL KNOW THAT; AND IF YOU DENY IT YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW YOUR OWN MIND. And if I am God’s apostle, brethren, you’d better listen because I speak the truth and I speak it in the name of Jesus Christ and by His authority!

Now Satan’s idea was every man for himself. “I’m for myself.” Vanity means, “I’m above everybody else.” That means then that I look down on others. I’m against others. I choose me instead of them. I love me. You know, I often repeat this old song they had when we came out to Oregon in 1924 and when we came from Iowa. When we arrived out in Oregon, there was a popular song quite popular at that time. It was, “I love me, OH, I LOVE ME. I’M WILD ABOUT MYSELF. I PUT MY ARMS AROUND MYSELF AND GIVE MYSELF A SQUEEZE. I’LL MARRY ME SOME DAY. OH, I LOVE ME; but I don’t care about anybody else.”

Now that is Satan; and Satan says, “Every man for himself.” If every man goes for himself, one man wants to go one way, another wants to go another, and another another way, and another another way; and all you have it confusion, and finally you have anarchy. That’s what it leads to, finally to anarchy; and this world is getting very close to that now. It’s getting more and more that way. Every group wants to go the way of that group against other groups. Every person wants to go the way of that person.

NOW, SATAN HAS A LAW; and HE CHANGED THE GOVERNMENT he’s enforcing on the THRONE OF THIS EARTH to EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF – SELFISHNESS, SELF-GLORY; and that means envy and jealousy toward others. “Well, I’m for me, I’m not for anybody else.” That is Satan’s LAW, AND THAT IS THE LAW AND THE WAY OF THIS WORLD. Jesus Christ came to teach just the OPPOSITE way, of LOVE toward others. Don’t have jealousy and animosity against others. Have love towards them. Be kind.

I have said often lately, Jesus taught us to pray for our enemies; and I pray for my enemies first before I pray for you people because you don’t need it so badly. My enemies need it. I LOVE my enemies. I don’t want to have to see them go into a Lake of Fire. I don’t want to see them have to suffer. I pray that GOD will do SOMETHING to GET HOLD of them and WAKE THEM UP AND MAKE THEM SEE HOW WRONG THEY ARE AND THAT THEY ARE GOING THE WRONG DIRECTION SO THAT THEY WILL TURN AROUND AND GO GOD’S WAY so they don’t have to reap what they’re sowing; and that’s what they are going to do.

Brethren, that’s the love that can come only from God. I didn’t used to have that kind of love. I do now. I love my enemies. I have enemies that, well, I hate to use that word but I could say that they hate my guts. But they do. They would kill me if they thought they could get away with it.

So Satan has his government, and he is RULING THE WORLD with HIS GOVERNMENT.

Now the LAW OF GOD is the law of the GOVERNMENT OF GOD. AND THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS THE FAMILY OF GOD into which WE MAY BE BORN WHEN WE BECOME GOD LIKE HE IS, HIS CHILDREN. Jesus is not ashamed to call us “brethren.” We can call Him “Brother Jesus,” and Jesus calls us “brother so-and-so” or “sister so-and-so.” He may not just come out with those words all the time, but then that’s in His heart. That’s in His mind and His thinking.

So God offered life to the first man, Adam, but that life would come with God’s Spirit. And God’s law is love, and love is the fulfilling of God’s law. But it takes a divine love to FULFILL it. Now HUMAN love won’t do it. Human love, well, it can be pretty good. You see what Adam chose was the Tree of the knowledge of good as well as evil; and man has an idea of good, and he has his ethic. He wants to be thought of as important, and so he wants other people to think he is good.

I guess the highest form of love that is normal and human is MOTHER love, the way a mother loves her baby. But, you know, she doesn’t love other babies like that. She loves it because that one is HERS. That baby came out of her, and she loves that baby because it belongs to HER. She doesn’t love others that way. She won’t pray for her enemy necessarily, not unless she is a Christian.

So God offered life. But Adam took to himself. Now, notice what he took. Eve strayed away; and Adam wasn’t on the job like he should have been, in loving authority over his wife. He wasn’t looking after her, and he let her slip away and get outside where she met SATAN. SATAN didn’t say, “Now look here Eve, I want you to come to my government. I want you to accept me as your god, and I want you to go my way.” He didn’t say ANYTHING LIKE that! He said, “Look Eve, you do the thing that looks right to you. You go your own way. Now, you just look at that forbidden fruit. God wasn’t fair. See, God held that back. He was sort of stingy. He didn’t give you everything, did He? He held that back. He is cheating you. Just look how beautiful that is. That’s good for food; and it will make you WISE, and you’ll be like God knowing good and evil.”

You know, she was deceived. It did look good; and she began to covet that Tree, so she reached out and took it even though she knew God said, “Don’t.” She gave it to her husband. He wasn’t deceived; but he took it, and went right along with her. Instead of being a man and ruling his wife in loving authority and telling her, “No, you shouldn’t have taken that, Eve; and you must not take it.” He let her take it, and he took it WITH HER; and he SINNED. So God CLOSED UP THE TREE OF LIFE, which is the Holy Spirit, until Christ, the 2nd Adam, would come.

Now a WORLD DEVELOPED; and Satan, RIGHT AT THAT TIME, KIDNAPPED ALL HUMANITY BECAUSE ALL HUMANITY HAS BEEN BORN FROM ADAM AND EVE. YOU AND I ALL CAME FROM ADAM AND EVE. They began to have children; and their children had children; and their children had children and kept enlarging and growing and multiplying until there are about 4 1/3 or 4 1/2; billion of us today on earth.

Satan kidnapped us; and Christ had to come and pay the RANSOM PRICE to bring us back to God, because Satan had kidnapped us away from God. Here is what happened: (Now think of this, and maybe you never thought of it this way before.) The WORLD that has been KIDNAPPED, instead of WANTING to get back to its Maker, wants to stay with the kidnapper; and the world wants God to keep His nose out of their affairs. It says, “I like the idea of going my own way and doing my own thing.” That is the LAW OF THIS WORLD. THAT IS SATAN’S LAW, and he sits on the THRONE OF THE WORLD. HE IS A KING OF KINGS AND A LORD OF LORDS. HE’S THE GOD OF THIS WORLD. I read that to you, II Corinthians 4:4{7}.

So Satan deceived the world to go the way of self. The Holy Spirit was closed until Christ should come, and Jesus Christ was the 2nd Adam. Now He came as an ADAM to start GOD’S world. The 1st Adam was used by Satan to start SATAN’S world, and this was Satan’s world. Jesus came to start GOD’S world, another world; and He started it with the one man, Jesus. Jesus called TWELVE and began to say, “Come out of the world and be separate.” Others began to follow Him; and, of those who began to follow Him, very soon many of them began to turn away. He said to His disciples, “Will you desert Me and will you turn away also?”

Some people say, “Mr. Armstrong you started a Church here.” No, I didn’t. God did it. He just used me a little bit. But they say, “You’re all wrong. Look how many people have gone out of the Church.” Yes, I know; they sure have. Of course, it is only a comparatively small percent; but, nevertheless, it’s several hundred. As a matter of fact, probably by now even a few thousand. But it’s only a few thousand, and there are a hundred thousand of us that are still here.

So Christ is wrong and they were RIGHT? Oh, no. So some of those that are SOUR and EMBITTERED, they have GONE OUT of the Church. One man wrote me recently. He said, “Mr. Armstrong,” he said “Christians have GONE OUT; and you’ve got people in the Church that are NOT Christians, and they are the RIGHT ones (the ones that went OUT).” Well, he needs to have his head examined because I find he was sent out to be Pastor of a Church, and he’d been misleading them. We’ve just found it out, and within the last 10 days he’s had to be put out. God says MARK THOSE THAT CAUSE DIVISION AND OFFENSES CONTRARY TO THE WORD OF GOD. MARK THEM AND GET RID OF THEM. But we didn’t have to get rid of this man. He got rid of himself. He put himself out.

But Jesus came and said, “I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH.” I asked at the beginning of this sermon WHY SHOULD THERE BE A CHURCH? WHY? God had to start another world, and the Church is the beginning of GOD’S WORLD. We are just the embryo, beginning. You know, Jesus used the parable of the grain of mustard seed. That’s the smallest of all, but it finally becomes the biggest and will fill the whole earth.

The Church started with one man – Jesus, the 2nd Adam. But this 2nd Adam took the Holy Spirit and obeyed God, instead of disobeying like the 1st Adam did. The 2nd Adam then began to teach others to follow that same way. One went out. He got put out. Jesus said to him, He knew what was on his mind, what he was going to do; and Jesus said at that last supper, “What you do, do quickly.” So he got up and went out, and he was gone. Others left Jesus while He was still on earth. And then what did they do? They began to try to kill the apostles, and most of the apostles were martyred and put to DEATH.

WHY DID THEY PUT JESUS TO DEATH? BECAUSE OF WHAT HE PREACHED, BECAUSE OF THE GOSPEL – BECAUSE OF WHAT HE PREACHED, THE WAY OF GOD. THEY DIDN’T WANT IT. THEY WANTED TO STAY KIDNAPPED. THEY WANTED TO STAY CHILDREN OF SATAN. You look in the 8th chapter of the book of John beginning with verse 30. The book of John the 8th chapter beginning with verse 30, now read on several verses and you’ll find there He’s speaking of many Jews that BELIEVED on Christ. And of those Jews who BELIEVED on Him, He said, “You are [the children] of your father [Satan] the devil” and his work you will do. “YOU DON’T BELIEVE ME. YOU DON’T BELIEVE WHAT I SAY.” It seems that people don’t want to believe what Jesus SAYS. This Bible is just what He says. It is His Word, and they don’t want to believe it.

Jesus came to CALL people OUT OF THIS WORLD – to surrender to God and to GOD’S WAY OF LIFE, AND TO GOD’S LAW, which means THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD. Be no part of this world. We have to live in it. We have to be subject to the authorities that are over us, which means ultimately even subject to Satan; but that doesn’t mean obey him. It means just be subject. When you have to disobey in order to obey God, then you’re subject to whatever penalty the law puts on you.

Now let’s take the early apostles. The apostle Paul wrote many of his books while he was put in prison. So he was being subject to the government. THEY WERE WRONG; but he was subject to them, and he subjected himself to be put in prison by them. Peter was put in prison{8}.

Character, spiritual character, must be formed in us; and then, by a resurrection from the dead, we can be made “what we shall be,” wholly spirit – if we receive God’s Spirit, if we grow in grace and knowledge, if we continue to obey and be doers and not only hearers of God’s will and God’s law, and if we endure unto the end. We shall be beautiful.

Angel creation was dual. It, of necessity, had to be, because angels we think of as being holy and righteous; but in II Peter 2 and verse 4 we read; “For if God spared not the angels that SINNED … ” You know, that ought to stagger anyone to read that – that angels sinned. What? Holy, righteous angels? They sinned. How could they sin? If God had made them holy and righteous to begin with, and their creation was complete, they had to stay the way they were made. They couldn’t change, because spirit does not change. But they did change some way. They became sinners.

Now we read back here in the 28th chapter of Ezekiel {9}, speaking of Lucifer, who became Satan the Devil. In verse 14; “thou art the anointed cherub that covereth.” He had been on the very throne of God in heaven. He had known the way of God. He knew the government of God. He had been there observing and having a part in the administration of the government of God at the throne of the whole universe. And then God had put him on the earth. And then verse 15:

Ezekiel 28:15 Thou was perfect in thy ways from the day that thou was created till iniquity was found in thee.

That can mean ONE THING ONLY! SINCE SPIRIT DOES NOT CHANGE, it can mean only one thing: that when God first created Lucifer and his angels, their creation was not completed. He created them in dual stages. The icing on the cake had not been put on. CHARACTER had not been formed in them. Of necessity, it COULD NOT have been formed in them because CHARACTER is the ability of a SEPARATE ENTITY WITH FREE MORAL AGENCY TO MAKE UP ITS OWN DECISIONS, INDEPENDENT OF GOD. In others words, a separate entity that becomes perfected and completed has a part in its own creation.

Now you and I have a part in our creation as we ultimately are to become, brethren. We have a great part in it! But don’t forget that we are a work of God’s hands. His creation is going on in us, but we have OUR PART in it; and yet the character that is to come into us comes from God. It’s God’s character, which must come into us. But it must come with our consent, with our desire, with our will and willingness; and we have to will ourselves and have the WILLPOWER to go that way and go that way constantly. That’s why we were PUT HERE. That’s the purpose of life.

Now angels had minds; but angel creation could not be complete, since they were to have CHARACTER, until the CHARACTER had been formed in them. So angels were made out of spirit, but UNFINISHED. They were given minds. They were given free moral agency. They could have knowledge. They could weigh it. They could think about it, because they had independent minds. Each angel had an independent mind all his own, just as you and I have. But angels finally had sinned. They made the wrong decision.

Now you explain that from Ezekiel 28 where he was put; because God formed him, but it’s like the cake is perfect but it isn’t finished till the icing was put on it. Now let’s get that: “…till iniquity was found in thee.” Now that iniquity didn’t come from God. GOD DIDN’T CREATE THAT IN HIM. But God CAN’T CREATE PERFECT CHARACTER BY FIAT. THE INDEPENDENT ENTITY, the CREATED entity, HAS to make a decision and have its own part in that creation and in that decision; or there can be no character. Now in verse 17:

Ezekiel 28:17 Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty; thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness:

God made him so beautiful it went to his head. You know I think so many humans, they suddenly are promoted and they get a higher office in the Work of God. It goes to their head. Do you know that half of those that have been raised and elevated to the highest rank in God’s church (to that of Evangelist), half of them have either been put out or gone out of God’s Church. They couldn’t take it. They didn’t endure to the end. In fact, I think some of them have never admitted they were wrong in the first place. Of course, God knows. I don’t.

But the very fact of what you read here in Ezekiel 28 means God had NOT completed the creation of the angels until THEY THEMSELVES had decided. And this Lucifer let this brightness go to his head. He let envy and jealousy come into him. All of his angels followed him, and that was a third of the angels. Now they didn’t each one independently think of it, because we find, that when he had turned, that Lucifer became Satan; and Satan is a deceiver. He deceives all of the world. Well, he deceives his own angels; and I feel he could not have done that just in one 24-hour day. He is very cunning, very subtle. So he came to them as an angel of light, as he always pretends to be. Little by little, he got them to thinking that maybe God wasn’t quite fair.

God had given Lucifer and his angels only this little earth down here, and the whole universe is a pretty big place. Even in our own solar system, look at the larger planets: Jupiter, Saturn, other planets bigger than the earth and a lot of other planets. God was still ruling all of that and all of the other galaxies, millions and millions of times more of them. And the very fact that he said to Eve, “Didn’t God holds something back? He didn’t give you all of the trees in the garden, did He?” Well, you see, he had been using that same psychology on his angels. “God didn’t give you everything. He held something back.” He got them to be a little bit envious, a little bit jealous, and finally a little resentful – until they turned against God and were willing to be formed into an army to swoop up into heaven and try a coup and take over the throne of the whole universe from God and rule the whole universe. But they got cast back down to earth; and Lucifer became Satan the Devil, and his angels became demons.

Now, they are immortal. Once their character was complete (and they had to have their part in it) – and once they had made their part of the decision, their character was complete; and once their character was complete … Well, I tell you what it makes me think of: It’s like our pouring cement. At first it is sort of unfinished; and when we pour it, it is fairly thick but it is still somewhat liquid and men can walk down in it and it splashes around. But, in a few hours, it hardens. It dries and hardens. And once it hardens it becomes very hard. Maybe it is not permanent. Over enough thousands of years cement wears. But, for the time being, it is very hard.

Now once angels made their DECISION, once the creation was COMPLETE, THEY ARE SPIRIT AND THEIR SPIRIT IS COMPLETE, THEY ARE COMPLETED spirits and they CANNOT CHANGE. SATAN CAN NEVER CHANGE. God can’t be born as an angel and redeem the angels and redeem Satan. If He can, it is certainly not revealed at any place I’ve found in the Bible. And apparently they are going to have to go on in their own wretched mind that they have set themselves to – that they have chosen of their own free will, knowing the other side and knowing better.

Now they had never sinned in the first place. They just went into sin deliberately, and they knew. They had great minds, and they had the knowledge. How long they had existed before they sinned, we aren’t told; but apparently it was a long, long time.

Now then, after they had sinned, God formed man after His own image. But how did He form man? Go back again to Genesis and in verse 26.

Genesis 1:26 God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.

But what did He form man of? Not spirit, like angels. Verse 7, chapter 2, just across the page in my Bible:

Genesis 2:7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground [not out of spirit like He had angels, but the dust of the ground] and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man [the dust of the ground] became a living soul.

Now there is living matter, but that doesn’t mean that it is permanent like spirit. It’s only temporary, and he became a temporary living piece of matter. He became a living soul. But a soul is material. It came out of the of the ground, and it is not spiritual. It is not eternal. And God said to that soul, “If you take of the wrong fruit instead of taking of the tree of REVEALED knowledge and of the love of God that will give you the love to fulfill the law which He will reveal … ”

Then he would become immortal; but he was not made immortal. He was made … Again, his creation was complete physically; but his creation was complete only physically. Now physically he was made incomplete though at the start. Let me go back on that. God’s purpose was for him to “multiply and replenish the earth.” In other words, to reproduce. But the man alone could not reproduce. I’ve mentioned this a number of times. So God had to take a rib from him and make a woman, and now he was complete.

The two became one. They became one flesh, and they could reproduce; and they did. They had a son. His name was Cain. They reproduced again and had another son. His name was Abel. But they hadn’t followed God’s way. They didn’t follow God’s law. They didn’t teach Cain God’s law or God’s way. So Cain became the first murderer and perhaps the first human liar, although Satan gave the first lie.

They were also mentally incomplete, and they were spiritually incomplete. God gave them a mind that animals do not have. In order to do that, God put one spirit – a human spirit – in Adam. And God so formed Adam that, in every human born, a human spirit would come in to that human. Now that spirit is no part of the human. It is just something in him, that leads him at best; and it is something that imparts the power of intellect to a physical brain. The human physical brain is no better than an animal’s brain; but it can do a lot things an animal can’t because of that spirit that is there.

But mentally it is only half there. It has only ONE spirit; and to have a full mind it needs another spirit, the Holy Spirit of God. It can’t receive SPIRITUAL KNOWLEDGE, so it was spiritually incomplete too. It had one spirit all right, and that gave it spirit so the spirit in it could come to have spiritual attitude of malice, of resentment, of hatred, of competition and strife, of rebellion, of vanity, of greed, lust. Oh, it’s going to have all of that; but it, of itself, does not know how to have godly love. It does not know how to have love toward others.

So that gets into the Two Trees, which I have spoken on so much now (for about a year and a half). Now one of those Trees meant God revealed knowledge and attitude; and, of course, if he took of that that was the Tree of Life. That would give him GOD LIFE, and even that God life would come in the dual stages: First in this life with the Holy Spirit, and secondly through a resurrection he would become a complete spirit being.

Now then, the second Tree was a tree of self-devised knowledge and attitude. Now God made him and created him with ability to deal with matter, as I’ve said so many times, with material things. But also he had the ability to come to a certain spiritual attitude; but not the attitude of God’s love because it takes the “love of God spread abroad in or hearts” to pour out from us in that kind of love, and Adam was not made with that. So he was made incomplete. Again, God starts his creation incomplete; and it has to be finished later, as he goes along.

Now, why did God make him mortal? Why did He make him of matter instead of spirit? Well, if man chose the wrong way, if he did the wrong way, he could change, he could repent. Matter can CHANGE. Matter is always changing anyway. Spirit cannot. Once the angels made the wrong choice and their creation was complete, they can never change. They are always going to be evil forever, and they have immortality and will exist forever.

With Adam, it is just as if He had asked, “Adam, would you like to take over the rulership of this whole universe?” And he could have taken it over from Satan, but he made the wrong decision. He made a decision just like Satan had made; but the decision man made can be changed – because he is mortal, because he is made out of matter.

Now then, at the time Adam made that decision, four things happened. I’ve taken a lot of time to go over these four things. I’ll just mention it real quickly. At that time, as you read in Revelation 13:8, Christ, as the Lamb of God, it was decreed then and arranged in God’s plan that He would be slain in due time. ”The Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world.” The foundation of the world began when Adam made that decision.

It was also decreed at that time, and God decreed it, that it was appointed that man then should die; but after that the judgment, and that there should be a resurrection. God ordained that man, if he made this mistake, everyone who ever had lived was going to be resurrected. Or, as you read in I Corinthians 15 beginning with verse 22:

I Corinthians 15:22-23 … as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all [the same ALL]be made alive. (23) But every man in his own order … [Now Christ became human; and He was the first to be resurrected immortal, 1951 years ago.] … afterward they that ARE Christ’s [I hope that includes us, brethren.] at Christ’s {10} coming

And then after that two more resurrections are to come, as you read in the 20th chapter of Revelation. Then another thing happens, you read in Genesis{11} 3 verses 22 to 24; God closed the Holy Spirit so man can’t, just of his own accord, go in and take the Holy Spirit, not unless God decides to give it to him.

Now then, that founded this world under those conditions; and this world was founded. It started. As I say, the first son born killed his own brother and then lied to God about it; and man started out in violence. Now notice how things continued from then, chapter 6 in Genesis.

Genesis 6:1,5-6,11-12 And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them [Skip down to verse 5.] (5) And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (6) And it repented the Lord {12} that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. [Then we read further in verse 11.] (11) The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. (12) And God looked upon the earth and behold it was corrupt; for all flesh [all flesh]had corrupted his way upon the earth.

Now God had given men a temporary existence, and up to that time they were living about 900 years of life. God found Noah. Noah found favor in God’s sight, and he was perfect in his physical generations; and God chose Noah to save humanity alive.

So why did God kill all of those people? I want to come on a little further before I answer that question. Man’s temporary existence was cut off – all of them, as I say, except 8 people – and started a world all over again. Why did God allow carnal life for the six thousand years? Why didn’t God cut human life off at the time of Adam? Why has He allowed carnal people to go on, and yet the Holy Spirit cut off from them so they CAN’T BE CONVERTED? GOD’S PURPOSE IS THE CREATION OF CHARACTER. GOD’S PURPOSE IS TO REPRODUCE HIMSELF OUT OF US, OUT OF MAN. WHY DID HE ALLOW PEOPLE TO GO ON AND NO SALVATION WAS OFFERED TO THEM?

I think my own experience shows a little of the reason. I’ve thought about that a great deal, brethren. Why did God allow people, and give them no chance of salvation? What has that got to do? What is human life through these six thousand years up to now? What has that had to do with creating righteous, holy, perfect spiritual character within us?

I look back at my own experience. It came to me one night just as I was preparing for bed and for sleep. I was thinking on these things, and I began to think that God was somehow dealing into my life and with me before my conversion. Now my conversion didn’t take place until I was 34 years of age. I had been what I thought was quite successful in this world, and then God had taken every bit of that away from me. God had caused, in the flash depression of 1920, my clients from whom all of my income derived to go into receivership; and those who had any money invested lost what they had and all of the officers of the company were removed.

Now that included the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company; that included the JIP Plough Works; that included John Deer and Company – they were my clients. The name went on. The companies still exist today. But I went down and lost everything at the same time those big corporations did because my income came from them. But, you know, I have thought many times that the EXPERIENCE that I had in those years prior to age 34 when God struck me down into poverty after I had been successful, I{13}…